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The Detroit Lions have finally won a playoff game. The Overton Window is shifting
In 2011-12 the Detroit Lions went into Lambeau Field on New Year’s Day with a 10-5 record. A win over the Packers, who were resting Aaron Rodgers due to the #1 seed being locked up, would give the Lions the first wild card and the #5 seed in the NFC playoffs. The reward would be a trip to New York to face the 9-7 Giants, the perceived weakling of the NFC division winners. A loss in that seeming layup game and the Lions would fall to 10-6 and the #6 seed, shipping them out to daunting New Orleans and the 13-3 Saints.
Diehard Lions fans know what happened, the infamous Matt Flynn Game, when the Lions singlehandedly earned Flynn $9 M in guaranteed money after the backup QB threw for 480 yards and 6 TDs in the snow against Detroit’s woeful secondary. The Lions nearly pulled the game off anyway, but instead fell 45-41. The performance earned Flynn that contract with the Seattle Seahawks in the offseason, a deal that went horribly wrong for Seattle, while the Lions disappointingly had missed a shot to snap the Lambeau losing streak and were condemned to the 6th seed in the playoffs.
In the aftermath of that frustrating loss, the thing that hurt the most was feeling like the Lions had blown their shot to get a playoff win. Not just because playing the Saints was going to be a lot harder than playing the Giants (surely that Giants team was an easy out in the playoffs), but because going into the Superdome and winning felt like an impossible task. At the time the most fearsome venue in pro football, the Saints were 3-0 in the Brees era at home in the playoffs and that year had gone 8-0 at home during the regular season. The Lions themselves had played the Saints in New Orleans in early December and lost in an only semi-competitive game. It felt at that time like there was no way you could imagine that young Lions team going into the Superdome and winning. Not in that noisy, raucous environment against a team as good as the Saints were that season.
A few months earlier, the Lions had hosted the Chicago Bears at Ford Field on Monday Night Football. It was an environment so noisy that it forced the Bears into multiple false starts, an electric atmosphere that earned praise at the time. Domes retain sound well and with a passionate fanbase like the Lions have, one that has stuck with the team even through the six decades of losing, it felt like Ford Field could hypothetically be a massive edge if the team was good enough that said edge would matter. If they were ever good enough to host playoff games instead of going on the road as a sacrificial lamb to face a contender in their building.
The Lions lost to the Saints in that 2011 playoff game, hanging around in the first half but ultimately not being good enough, and blowing far too many chances (they dropped multiple would-be interceptions) to pull off a win. The Saints were unequivocally a better team that season and had the advantage of the Superdome on their side. As a young Lions fan, I watched that season and dreamed about one day getting to see the Lions host a playoff game. If the Superdome could be a big playoff advantage, surely Ford Field could be too. We had seen it on MNF against the Bears, after all. Believing that the intimidating environment of Ford Field could make a difference is part of what hurt so much about the Lions blowing the NFC North back in 2013. Getting to see Ford Field host a playoff game wouldn’t just be really cool, but it could be the little edge needed to finally win a playoff game.
[Daniel Mears/Detroit News]
Turns out, it was. The Lions hosted the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday night in a game watched by some 35+ M viewers and Ford Field delivered. It was the first Lion home playoff game since January 1994 and the first held inside the City of Detroit since the 1957 NFL Championship Game played on December 29, 1957. The crowd was frenzied and noisy all night long, declared by coach Dan Campbell to be the best NFL atmosphere he’d ever seen. Even unbiased NFL people who were in attendance were impressed, with longtime SI writer Peter King calling it a top 5 pro football environment he’d ever been a part of. As we learned today, Ford Field was the noisiest it had ever been in its history, registering at a noise level akin to a jet engine.
The boisterous Ford Field crowd wasn’t just flattering to those watching on television, though. What was significant about it is how it did make an impact on the game. In the second half, the Rams called two timeouts to avoid delay of game penalties after they had trouble relaying the plays from the coaching staff to the players on the field. Once the Rams punted back to the Lions with 4.5 minutes to go trailing by a point, LA thus had just one timeout remaining, meaning that the Lions needed just two first downs to win the game. One to bleed the clock down to the two minute warning and burn the timeout, and one more to get to kneel downs. It made it much easier for the Lions to win the game with their offense on the field, something they did.
Now, you can argue that Sean McVay shouldn’t have burned those timeouts because they are more important than the five yard penalties. I would agree. But any time your crowd is disrupting the opponent so that they have to contemplate burning a timeout or eating five yards, you’re doing well. Ford Field’s crowd made a difference in helping the Lions beat the Rams and end the 32 year playoff win drought. The hypothesis that 12-year-old me put forth, so it seems, was true. I just wish we didn’t have to wait another dozen years to test it.
In a season where the Lions have been retiring annoying and embarrassing TV broadcast facts about the franchise’s futility, ending “one playoff win since 1957” might be the sweetest. Not to say that “two playoff wins since 1957” is much better, but “won a playoff game as recently as 2023-24” is more pleasing to the ears. The Lions have to win another game to go as far as they did in the 1991-92 season, the one that contained their previous playoff win, but all you can do is win the games on your schedule. The Lions did that on Sunday.
The scene after the game was just as sweet as winning itself. Images of fans in the crowd crying. That guy who NBC had told us had been a season ticket holder for 66 years looking very pleased. The absolute roar of the stands as the final knee was taken to close it out. Dan Miller’s radio call of the Amon-Ra first down and then the voice crack when the game ended. As the crowd spilled out onto the frigid Detroit streets, more tears could be seen across the many reaction videos on the internet. According to David Montgomery, a crying woman approached him at the gas station and thanked him for the Lions winning this playoff game.
For many fanbases in the NFL, winning a Wild Card Round playoff game against a solid opponent would be cause for a mild bit of happiness but nothing too exciting. For Lions fans, it was the culmination of a sensational journey, a chance to release decades of anger and demons. Everything that seems so easy and ordinary for the majority of the league has perennially seemed like an impossible feat for this often hopeless, cursed team. When you go through what Lions fans have gone through, winning a division and then winning a playoff game are causes to pop champagne.
The Lions haven’t totally made it as a franchise. They’ve still got to win more in the playoffs. I don’t think anyone will say the Lions are not cursed anymore until they win the Super Bowl, or at the very least make the Super Bowl once. But the thing about finally meeting those pathetically low bars is once you tick the boxes, the next boxes on the list are a lot more normal. The vast majority of the league dreams of making and winning the Super Bowl. Lions fans had that dream in the back of their minds, but it felt so distant when faced with present reality. Let’s start with winning the division and a playoff game for once before we talk Super Bowl.
The Overton Window is a political science concept referring to the range of policies acceptable to an electorate at any given time. As Wikipedia describes, “the window frames the range of policies that a politician can recommend without appearing too extreme to gain or keep public office given the climate of public opinion at that time”. By shifting the Overton Window, one expands or changes the range of plausible policies the electorate is comfortable with, as previously “extreme” positions suddenly become normalized to the median voter. For example, many claim that Bernie Sanders’ introduction of Medicare For All into the American political mainstream was an example of the Overton Window shifting left on healthcare, or Donald Trump’s southern border wall plan an example of the Overton Window shifting right on immigration policy.
What Dan Campbell’s Detroit Lions have achieved in the past few weeks is a sports psychology example of the Overton Window shifting. For much of my life, the main thing I hoped to see from this football team was to win the NFC North, get a home playoff game, and ideally win it. Check, check, and check. We’ve crossed the league’s lowest bar of success and now all of the sudden, the range of outcomes to reasonably hope and expect from this team is going to shift considerably.
The training wheels have come off and the Lions are now a big league franchise. We’re no longer Indiana hoping to go 7-5 and make the Music City Bowl. We’re Penn State or Michigan now. We’re entering the ranks of teams like the Packers, 49ers, Ravens, Eagles, and Chiefs who expect real success, playoff wins, deep runs, Super Bowl championships. There’s a ~65% chance the Lions will be one win from playing in the Super Bowl this time next week. The hopes and optimism of October have crystalized into the realities of mid-January. The Lions have morphed into a regular old NFL playoff team and as fans, we have to find some way to get used to it.
[Nic Antaya/Getty Images]
The Takes: Offense
Jared Goff did what you want him to. In a week full of tremendously efficient QB performances in the playoffs, Goff wasn’t as flashy as some but it’s hard for me to have many issues with what he did. 22/27 (81.4%), 277 yards at 10.3 Y/A, 1 TD and zero turnovers. No issue from me with that. I didn’t chart his downfield success rate, but I recall very few issues with his game. He was too high when pressured on a 3rd down looking for Josh Reynolds in the second half and had that one bizarre fumble/lateral attempt on what should’ve been a sack, but that’s all I have. Goff was efficient, accurate with his throws, and decisive on his reads, as he normally is when the starting OL is healthy. Related: in 8 games this season when all five Lions starting OL played, Goff is firing at 69.7% completion with 18 TDs to 3 INTs, 2,395 yards at 8.5 Y/A, passer rating of 111.9. Hard to beat that.
Goff didn’t threaten deep much but he carved up the middle of the field with a couple dimes. The throw to Reynolds on the first drive was one of a couple exceptional throws that Goff made on the night, threading the ball through zone coverage for a first down. Statistically it was the best playoff game of Goff’s career and exactly what the Lions are going to need to keep progressing in the playoffs. If nothing else, a good first sign.
Explaining the rush offense. The Lions paved the Rams on their first three drives of the game on the ground, picking up yards at a 5-6-7 yards per carry clip. Then the success they had running the ball began to vanish, unable to reliably gain yards on the ground over the final four or so drives. What happened? Pretty simple, the Rams started to go with a 5-2 front, putting three defensive tackles on the field, and the Lions had issues finding traction on the interior against the heavy front. Ben Johnson tried to respond to the 5-2 fronts by targeting the perimeter, sweeps/tosses/pitches but the Lions had a lot of trouble blocking those and LA keyed in well on them. In a perfect world, they’d have executed a little better on those, or had the play-action game functioning a little better to force the Rams out of their 5-2 look, but oh well.
As a whole I don’t have a major issue with the offense? The Lions scored 24 points, which is a little less than I expected coming in and they only scored 3 in the second half, which I certainly wouldn’t have said was enough to win if you’d asked me at halftime. Yet as I look at this game I don’t really think I’m too disappointed with how the Lions’ offense performed. First of all, this was a low possession game- the Lions had seven real offensive drives total, the eighth being the final drive where the objective was to run out the clock. Secondly, they only ran 55 offensive plays total (LA also ran 55). Both teams embarked on long drives and with few incompletions for either team in the passing game, the clock kept running, limiting possessions.
On the Lions’ seven real possessions they went TD, TD, TD, punt*, FG, punt, punt. The asterisk recognizes the final drive before halftime, where the Lions got screwed out of a first down on the blown call offsides. If that is called correctly, the Lions are getting at least a FG, if not another TD on the drive. With correct officiating they’d have scored on 5/7 drives and even without it, they gained over 6 YPP and were perfect in the red zone in getting TDs, which won them the game. I’m not gonna be mad about that.
Blitz pickups, #1. We will revisit this bullet point in the defense section, but a crucial part of this game was picking up blitzes and the effectiveness of the two teams at it. On offense, the Lions had some major struggles in the second half picking up the Los Angeles blitzes, particularly from LB Ernest Jones IV. A couple times the Rams got Jones matched up on a Lion RB rushing the passer and in both cases the blitz still got home, Jones swimming by the RB enough to affect Goff’s throw. That was the case on the 3rd & 6 where the pocket compressed and Goff’s leg was tripped, leading to a sack and a punt, as well as the sack on 2nd & 15 that backed the Lions up and killed their drive, leading to the long FG. With a blitzy Tampa defense coming up, this is an area of emphasis.
Young receivers carrying the weight. I rarely write about Amon-Ra St. Brown in these pieces because he’s a superstar that doesn’t need explanation. He’s been terrific since he arrived in Detroit and not much changes with him. To see him dominate in his first playoff game was not surprising, but is worth noting. Sam LaPorta battled through his knee ailment and didn’t do a ton but made one of the biggest plays of the game carving up the EDGE in coverage on the 4th down TD. Jameson Williams was relatively quiet with only a couple catches but one was another tough catch in tight coverage. Jamo still needs to improve to live up to his draft slot but it is legitimate progress that he hasn’t dropped a ball in months and is increasingly reliable to not just make routine catches, but tough ones. Give me another deep bomb TD against Tampa!!
[Joel Bissell/MLive]
The Takes: Defense
Run defense was good again. The Lions having major problems in pass defense gets the most attention, and rightfully so, but Detroit bottled up a really good run offense and that’s something to be happy about. Kyren Williams has had an excellent year for LA powering a strong rush offense in the second half of the season. The Lions held that run offense to 4.0 YPC, 3.3 if you subtract the one 15 yard carry where they got hit by the cutback lane. Most runs were not at all effective and quickly stopped. That the Lions have managed to fix their run defense and transform into a really strong rush D is a good sign. Fixing the pass defense will be the priority for the offseason…
Blitz pickups, #2. The Lions’ defense got gashed again, 425 yards at 7.7 YPP, but there were a few swing moments that stood out to me that could have really altered the picture. One was the 3rd & 16 on the Rams’ second drive, when the Lions were up 14-3. If you get off the field there, the feel of the game is completely different, likely for the entirety of the game. I commented on the issues with the 3rd & forever after the game in Minnesota, begging Aaron Glenn to blitz on those snaps. He’s heeded my advice more in recent weeks and sent the blitz in this very situation. Problem was, it didn’t get home. The Rams lined up Williams under the center to nerf Anzalone’s rush in the A-gap but the Lions had it schematically figured out, with CJ Gardner-Johnson rushing in the right B-gap. However, for reasons I’m not able to tell, he seemed to get tripped up on his way through to Stafford, who had just enough time to sling a beautiful ball to his WR.
This wasn’t so much a great blitz pickup as it was unfortunate, but there were multiple other snaps where I thought the Rams were great at crushing the Lions’ blitzes. And when your 5 or 6 man pressure doesn’t get home, you’re going to be vulnerable, especially when your secondary is lacking in talent like Detroit’s is. Glenn gambled (which is the right thing to do with this roster), but mostly was coming up empty. By the later stages of the game I felt the Lions were better off dropping 7 or 8 when nothing was getting home. The Lions have had a lot of success getting home with those blitzes since Glenn got a bit more creative, so I think this was more of a Rams-specific problem than a Detroit one, but something to monitor.
Give Stafford a hand. On re-watch I found myself perhaps less dismayed than I expected about the performance of the Lions’ pass defense. It still isn’t good, and not where it needs to be, but Stafford also made some really nice throws into some tight windows. That throw on the aforementioned 3rd & 16 was a hell of a throw. His range of arm angles were all on display and he fit balls against solid coverage repeatedly, but that’s what you expect a really good NFL QB like Matt Stafford to do. Detroit’s pass defense needs to get better, but this game was a reminder that sometimes even when you have a good rep it may not matter against a QB who is in a groove as Stafford was. There are a number of culprits for LA’s loss, but Stafford was absolutely not one of them.
Red zone defense (and two Aidan Hutchinson rushes) wins the game. I felt coming into this one that the Lions needed to do three things defensively, 1.) create a turnover or two, 2.) pressure Stafford consistently, and 3.) force FGs in the red zone. They really only ticked three of those boxes, the third one, but boy did they tick it. Three red zone FGs was the difference in the red zone, a mix of questionable playcalling by Sean McVay (too much running? multiple fades for Cooper Kupp?), the Detroit pass D rising to the occasion, and some of Glenn’s best blitzes of the night coming in those situations. The third down blitz to force the first FG was a dandy that blew the play up, but you also have to credit the coverage some. Without the threat of the explosive play over the top in the red zone, they tightened up and did enough to get stops. It wasn’t pretty defensively, but they did enough in the red zone.
On re-watch I thought both Aidan Hutchinson and Alim McNeill were good for the Lions (surprise, surprise), but Hutchinson was huge when it mattered. He beat the RT around the corner to draw the hold which backed the Rams up out of FG range on the final defensive series, and then had another pressure on the 3rd & long that helped force the incompletion (and McVay’s cowardly punt). It wasn’t as much organic pressure as I’d have liked, and improving the organic pressure from the front ought to be a major emphasis of the offseason, but just like the red zone D, the Lions got the best results when it mattered the most.
Special Teams and Game Theory
Specialists for the win. In a game this tight, you can say so many things won the Lions the game. You can say that individually Amon-Ra, or Goff, or red zone defense, or Hutchinson’s late pressures, or McVay’s punt all each gave the Lions the win. You could say the same for the specialists, who were tremendous. Jack Fox flipped the field and pinned the Rams deep on all three punts. That the Rams were able to drive 79 yards yet only get a FG out of it on one possession is simply massive and was all due to Fox’s excellence in this game. Likewise, Michael Badgley’s 54 yard field goal was quite literally the winning points, a difficult kick that Badgley surprisingly drilled. We thought the Lions would have a special teams edge coming into this one and turns out we were right. It really did matter.
Dan Campbell definitely outcoached Sean McVay. I don’t think anyone is going to question that McVay is a very good head coach who is a great offensive mind. His game-management, however, has been a bit more mixed over the years and this was not a great one from him, contrasted by a very strong bit of management from Dan Campbell. Campbell didn’t have to make too many decisions, the 4th down near the goal line was a pretty obvious go for it (which paid off). Putting Badgley on the field was gutsy but also paid off. Lining up to go for it on the 4th down that incurred the false start/offsides nonsense was also the right, but pretty easy call (as was punting after the penalty). No issues from Campbell, whereas McVay made the questionable decision to burn two timeouts in the second half of a game he was trailing and then made his biggest mistake, the punt on the final Rams offensive series.
It was 4th & 14 from the Detroit 44. I get that the chance of conversion isn’t very high, but the Lions’ pass D is also a major sorespot and the Rams had picked up a long yardage conversion earlier in the game. With Matt freakin’ Stafford slinging the ball and Kupp/Nacua at your disposal, I think LA had a decent shot. And even if you don’t get it, the Lions needed two first downs to win the game anyway. Field position didn’t matter much when you only trailed by one. What did punting in that situation gain you? Better field position when you get it back? Well, you never got it back and maybe if you’d gone on 4th down, you’d have picked it up and never been in that situation.
Refereeing was … probably neutral? A lot of Lions fans went to dark places after yet another playoff refereeing fiasco. First the Brees fumble/Cliff Avril return, then the picked up flag, then the facemask TD in the Seattle game, and now the blown offsides. That was a plainly bad call and it cost Detroit a first down, which likely would’ve resulted in points. Devastating, but at the very least the referees made up for it. They didn’t call DPI on the first Rams drive out of halftime on 3rd down, which was pretty clearly a foul if you ask me. Rams fans were furious about no penalties on the 3rd & long on the final drive but I was more okay with that.
There was definitely a jersey tug and if you wanted to call a strict interpretation of the rule, I’d understand. I prefer to let DBs play a bit. You can’t bearhug a guy or tackle him, but a small, brief jersey tug followed by a well-played, well-timed PBU is okay with me. I like to see less of the referees announcing fouls and more of guys playing football. In totality, the referees cost the Lions points on one drive and made up for it by letting their DBs play in the second half and gifting them one stop in particular. That’s a trade I’m okay with, especially when there was no counter-balancing makeup call in Dallas nine years ago.
[Jason Behnken/AP]
The Road Ahead
Due to the upset of the Dallas Cowboys at the hands of the Green Bay Packers, the Detroit Lions will be hosting another playoff game this Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. In other words, the Dan Skipper/ineligible receiver boondoggle in Week 17 against Dallas ultimately ended up being inconsequential. Ball don’t lie, the Lions get their second home playoff game anyway.
In which case, it’s a throwback, old school NFC Central matchup. Let me be clear that while the Bucs have been decently hot down the stretch and definitely could beat the Lions, this is also the best draw you could ever have asked for in the second round of the postseason. Tampa went 9-8 in the regular season, the Lions beat the Bucs on the road by two touchdowns earlier in the season, and this one will be in Ford Field. The formula is there for this to be very winnable and indeed the Lions are 6.5 point favorites heading into this game. There may be future years where the Lions are a better team than they are currently, but they may never get a more manageable path to the NFC Championship Game than this one.
The Bucs started the season 3-1, then lost to the Lions in that mid-October matchup which began a 1-6 stretch that left them 4-7 at the end of November. However, a 5-1 finish to the regular season netted Tampa their third straight division title and on Monday they knocked off the corpse of the Philadelphia Eagles. On paper it’s an impressive win, but the Eagles’ collapse was so dramatic and stunning it’s hard to say that it was much of a feat for the Bucs. On one hand, you can never diminish going 6-1 (incl. playoffs) over any seven game period in the National Parity League, but on the other hand, only one of Tampa’s results looks particularly impressive, that being their convincing win in Lambeau over the Packers. Otherwise they have two resounding wins over seemingly decent teams who were in total collapse (Jacksonville/Philly), several close wins over bad teams (4 point win over Atlanta, 3 and 9 point wins over Carolina), and a 10 point home loss to a firmly mediocre Saints team.
I think the best way to describe the Buccaneers right now is a mediocre team playing with a lot of confidence. Which can be dangerous! But the Lions are definitely the better team and will be playing at home. Total yardage in that first game was 380-251 Detroit and YPP was 5.5-4.6 Detroit. The Bucs are a better team now than they were then, but so are the Lions, who were without Jahmyr Gibbs (the entire game) and David Montgomery (injured early in the game) at RB, as well as Brian Branch and Jonah Jackson, who both missed the game. All those players are fully healthy going into this one. Tampa, in contrast, was largely healthy for that first meeting.
I’m expecting this one to be higher scoring than the defensive battle the first one was. The Lions’ offense is healthier and better situated to attack the Bucs and I think Baker Mayfield is in more of a groove than he was earlier in the year. The concern for the Lions defensively is obviously the pass defense, not just because of recent results but because there were a couple busts in that first meeting with Tampa that Mayfield juuuuust missed that could’ve turned the game around. With WRs Mike Evans and Chris Godwin the main targets for Tampa, it’s reasonable to expect that they will hit a couple of those this time. The other weapons don’t really worry me, TE Cade Otton is pretty middling and RB Rachaad White is merely fine. Tampa’s run blocking has been iffy and they rank 31st out of 32 teams in rush yards per game. Against the Lions’ run defense, you can expect there won’t be a ton of traction for TB on the ground. Tampa will probably be in some 3rd & longs and it’s up to the Lions to finally find ways to get off the field in those situations.
Offensively, the big key is picking up Tampa’s blitzes, something I referenced earlier. HC Todd Bowles is a master of crafty blitzes and it’s on the Lions to be prepared to pick those up. RBs will need to do better in pass protection, but this is where it helps to have the starting OL healthy and a veteran QB at the helm. They ought to be seasoned at identifying those blitzes pre-snap and playing around them. Even with 3rd and 4th string RBs playing plus Kayode Awosika starting at G in the first matchup, the Lions did pretty well against Tampa’s pressure and Goff played one of his best games of the season. Bowles threw a lot at him and Goff stood in there against pressure and sliced Tampa up. Goff was 30/44 for 353 at 8.0 Y/A with 2 TD and zero turnovers in that game. I will take a repeat of that on Sunday, please!
Overall, this is a winnable game and it would be hard to not be disappointed if the Lions can’t get it done. I know at the outset of the season I said that a division title and a playoff win would constitute an unambiguously successful season. I still believe that to be true, but now it feels a bit like a win on Sunday is necessary to achieve the peak satisfaction season. Which is pretty crazy to say. Win that game and you’re presumably off to San Francisco for the NFC Championship Game, where there will be no expectations whatsoever to beat the juggernaut 49ers.
There is the possibility that Green Bay could pull off the 9.5 point upset and it could be an NFC North, Lions-Packers conference title game. I’m not going to write it off, not with how well Green Bay’s offense is playing right now, but the 49ers are the better team there and should win that game. My guess is a high scoring affair that San Francisco eventually comes out on top on. But hey, I could be wrong!
In any event, this is the culmination of a fun season. By far the most fun of any Lions season in the last 30 years and we should appreciate that. I hope it keeps going with more victories in the future but if it doesn’t, I’m satisfied to sit here and enjoy it. There will be tough battles in the future but let’s not focus too much on that. For now, let’s focus on Tampa Bay only and relish that for once the Lions aren’t an irrelevant laughingstock hoping to meet even the lowest bars of success. In this moment they’re just a regular old NFL team getting ready for a Divisional Round playoff matchup. I like this reality and hope we get used to it.
Fantastic article Alex! Well done